Mexico overcame two disallowed goals to beat Cameroon 1-0 with a second-half strike by Oribe Peralta. Mexico, on top throughout, were goalless at halftime after Giovani Dos Santos' volley and header were both ruled offside

Mexico got its man. Now the question is whether it can keep him. The trophy is Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, head of the Sinaloa drug cartel. Mexican Marines arrested him in the port city of Mazatlan, in a beachfront condo -- reportedly without a shot fired

The recent capture of the world's biggest drug kingpin, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, was heralded across the world as a major triumph, but the fact that it was carried out by the Mexican navy should make us skeptical about its significance

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto's approach to combating Mexican drug cartels has been a much-discussed topic since well before he was elected. Mexico is taking a more holistic approach to the cartel problem but will not abandon the use of force against cartels

The governments of Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Mexico all called for developing more effective responses to drug trafficking based on promoting public health, respect for human rights, and harm reduction

An amendment to a standing water treaty between the United States and Mexico has received publicity the past six months as an example of progress in water sharing agreements. But the amendment is a glimpse into ongoing mismanagement of the Colorado River on the U.S. side

Something very unusual happened at the OAS annual foreign ministers' meeting: the United States and Mexico won a diplomatic victory over authoritarian populist governments that wanted a free hand to suppress human rights monitors and critical media

Perhaps Secretary of State John Kerry's lack of attention to Latin America might not be so bad after all - it is moving Vice President Joe Biden to get more involved with the region, and may help turn U.S.-Latin American relations into a White House foreign policy priority

Forget all the headlines about immigration, security and drug issues during President Barack Obama's visit to Mexico: the most important (and least noticed) result of his trip may have dealt with an entirely different topic - student exchanges

What a pleasant surprise! Mexico, whose government routinely supports human rights violators throughout the region, played a key role in thwarting an effort by a group of countries to weaken the region's most important human rights commission

Latin American presidents who support decriminalization of marijuana won a big diplomatic victory in recent days when the 34-country Organization of American States issued a report that considers that option as one of several policies that might help reduce the region's drug-related violence

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos may not have been hallucinating when he said that the Pacific Alliance - the bloc made up of Mexico, Colombia, Peru and Chile - 'is the new economic and development engine of Latin America and the Caribbean'

Mexican cartels have followed a trend of fracturing into regional crime networks for more than two decades. This trend toward polarization, with the cartel landscape largely split between the Sinaloa Federation and Los Zetas, has been reversed

After decades of unsuccessful efforts to modernize its public education system, President Nieto's government arrested almighty teachers' union leader Elba Esther Gordillo and - perhaps more important - signed a constitutional amendment that will allow key education reforms

It's no wonder that protesters in Brazil held signs reading 'more education, less soccer,' or that there are constant teacher strikes in Argentina, Chile, Venezuela and Mexico - Latin American schoolteachers are among the most miserably paid in the world

In 2013, violence in Mexico likely will remain a significant threat. Overall levels of violence decreased during 2011, but cartel operations and competition continued to afflict several regions of Mexico throughout 2012

Candidates frequently aspire to institute particular policies when elected, but once in office, presidents often find that their policy choices are heavily constrained by outside forces. This concept holds true for the president of Mexico

In most Latin American countries, companies complain about the shortage of well-trained engineers. And the experience of China, India, Taiwan, and other Asian countries shows that producing large numbers of engineers pays off

We all know what conventional economists say about the future of Latin America: countries that pursue populist policies will go downhill, whereas countries that pursue 'responsible' economic policies will do great

Mexico's president-elect Nieto maintains that there was no vote-buying in the contested vote, but told us that he would support putting behind bars any member of his own party found guilty of electoral fraud

NAFTA was touted as the cure for Mexico's economic 'backwardness.' Promoters argued that the trilateral trade agreement would dig Mexico out of its economic rut and modernize it along the lines of its mighty neighbor, the United States

A new study on corruption in Latin America contains some alarming figures -- an average of about 20 percent of the region's people say they have been asked to pay a bribe by a policeman or another public official in the past year

With virtually all polls showing that candidate Enrique Pena Nieto is likely to win the July 1 elections, the big question is whether his victory would mean a return to Mexico's corruption-ridden, authoritarian ways of the past

The turmoil for reform sweeping most Middle Eastern oil producers is grabbing big headlines today, but that region may lose some of its economic clout in the future: there are signs that the Americas will replace the Middle East as the world's biggest oil-producing region

Mexicans want change, and Peña Nieto's offer of "responsible change" has more appeal than leftist candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador's calls for social justice, which some fear would lead to a Venezuelan-styled radical populism

Two new studies confirm what we have long suspected: Latin American companies cannot effectively compete in the world economy because their countries' educational systems are totally disconnected from reality

A new United Nations report has good news for Latin America: it says that poverty levels in the region have dropped to their lowest levels in 20 years. But are the U.N. figures about Latin America as great as they sound?

Finally, there is a voice of reason on immigration among the front-runners for the Republican nomination, who until recently seemed to be competing with one another to see who could take the craziest stand against Hispanic immigrants

Since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) became the law of the land, millions of Mexicans have joined the ranks of the hungry. Malnutrition is highest among the country's farm families, who used to produce enough food to feed the nation

A new ranking of Latin America's best universities shows that Brazil is way ahead of the pack, with the No. 1 school and 65 of the best 200 in the region. It suggests that Brazil may become 'the next university superpower'

The recent torture and murder of two Mexican bloggers after anonymous posts on anti-crime blogs has shocked the country's internet community. But even more worrisome is how little elected leaders understand the importance of social media, in a country where criminals and citizens alike rely on it as an essential platform for communication

I read a press report that Brazil's tourism minister was illegally using a government driver as his wife's private chauffeur. By the time I arrived in Brasilia seven hours later, the minister had already been sacked. What a difference with what is happening in many other Latin American countries

Current policies, clearly, have unsatisfactory results. But what is to replace them? Neither of the standard alternatives -- a more vigorous pursuit of current antidrug efforts or a system of legal availability for currently proscribed drugs -- offers much hope. Instead, it is time for Mexico and the United States to consider a set of less conventional approaches

As the number of violent deaths along the U.S.-Mexico border continues to climb, a new report reveals a chilling trend: U.S. gun manufacturers, faced with declining sales, are increasingly selling high-powered military-style firearms to civilians

On the afternoon of May 27, a convoy transporting a large number of heavily armed gunmen was ambushed on Mexican Highway 15 near Ruiz, Nayarit state, on Mexico's Pacific coast. When authorities responded they found 28 dead gunmen and another four wounded, one of whom would later die, bringing the death toll to 29. This is a significant number of dead for one incident, even in Mexico

As one studies Mexico's cartel war, it is not uncommon to hear Mexican politicians â€" and some people in the United States â€" claim that Mexico's problems of violence and corruption stem largely from the country's proximity to the United States. According to this narrative, the countries positioned between the source countries and the U.S., are trapped in a very bad position

The world has been captivated by the drama unfolding in the aftermaths of uprisings in Libya, Tunisia, and Egypt, the so-called Arab Spring. But that doesn't mean the killings have stopped elsewhere, nor the challenges and dangers for the United States. Here are three major conflicts that could pop up on the front pages or TV screens any day

The escalation of drug-related violence in Mexico -- including the mass execution of 72 migrants -- is moving a small but growing number of U.S. foreign policy hawks to call for a radical solution: send in the U.S. Army

Republican Party candidates who won recent primary elections have gone so far to the right on the immigration issue, that they may have shot themselves in the foot. Look at what happened in Florida and Arizona, the two states with heavy Hispanic populations

Legalization of drugs -- long an issue championed mainly by fringe groups -- is rapidly moving to the mainstream in Latin America. A recent surprise statement by former Mexican President Vicente Fox in support of 'legalizing production, sales and distribution' of drugs made big headlines around the world

Everything that could possibly go wrong seems to be going wrong for Mexico, Latin America's worst performing economy this year. But a new government idea could put this country back on the road to prosperity for decades to come -- if government officials really are serious about it.

The conventional wisdom says that the U.S. economic slowdown will be devastating for Mexico and Central America because of their excessive dependence on the United States. But the conventional wisdom may be wrong

Across Latin America, governments are hailing security gains against organized criminal groups. Yet in spite of more arrests, criminal networks are stronger and criminality just as pervasive, suggesting that another reality lies behind the numbers.

Although the 1917 Mexican constitution called for democratic institutions, the actual implementation of democratic practices only began about a decade ago. Democracy really began to burgeon when the PRI, the party that once single-handedly ruled the nation, was ousted from the presidency in 2000 by the PAN

Mexico is silently working on proposals aimed at drawing millions of U.S. retirees to this country, which could eventually lead to the most ambitious U.S. - Mexican project since the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's trip to Mexico drew a lot of media attention to the bloody U.S.-backed war on the drug cartels along the border. But Mexico is facing five other wars that nobody is talking about, and that may pose even bigger threats than the drug lords.

To believe that capitalism and the United States are in an inexorable decline as Venezuela's ruling party states and a surprising number of Latin Americans believe, flies in the face of reality. In fact, the opposite is true

The summit was a missed opportunity to relaunch the 20-year-old free trade agreement among the three countries, but it produced a little-noticed plan that may have a big impact on North America's economic and cultural integration in coming years

The highly respected Nature Scientific Reports journal has just published a map of the world's leading science cities, and it looks pretty bad for emerging countries: It shows the planet's northern hemisphere full of lights, and the south almost solidly dark

New economic projections from the World Bank and the United Nations show that Latin America countries will keep growing at moderate rates this year, except for the booming economies of Paraguay, Panama and Peru

I couldn't help being surprised by the scornful reaction of many Mexicans to the growing consensus in the world media that this is 'Mexico's moment' in the global economy. There is a constellation of positive factors working in Mexico's favor

The 95-point political agreement signed by Mexico's three biggest political parties may have a positive impact on Mexico, and could teach a lesson of civility to the U.S. Congress as it continues fighting over how to avert a fiscal cliff

New Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto will have a big advantage over his two most recent predecessors -- he's lucky. Pena Nieto is starting his six-year-term under highly favorable economic and political conditions

The Trans-Pacific Partnership could add billions of dollars to the U.S. economy and solidify Washington's commitment to the Pacific. But if the Obama administration fails to calm critics of the deal, there is a growing possibility that it could collapse

Marco Rubio, Florida Republicans' golden politician, has served as the state's Junior Republican Senator. Born into a Cuban immigrant family, Rubio himself has weighed in with his opinion on the immigration reform issue

When we talk about the violence that has left nearly 50,000 dead in Mexico over the past five years, we usually focus on Mexico's drug cartels, but it may be time to include the U.S. National Rifle Association cartel

Every year brings about changes, but 2012 is likely to be an especially eventful one in the Americas: there will be elections in the United States, Mexico and Venezuela, as well as other news events that could change the political map

President Obama's announcement that he will seek to create what may be the world's largest trading bloc along the Pacific rim raises an interesting question in this part of the world: whether we will see a de facto split of Latin America into a Pacific and Atlantic bloc

Condoleezza Rice, whose boss President George W. Bush vowed during the 2000 campaign to make Latin America a 'fundamental commitment' of his presidency, devotes only two of the 58 chapters of her memoir 'No Higher Honor' to the region. That's about 15 pages of the 766-page book, plus a few sporadic references here and there

Presidential candidate Rick Perry is stirring up a firestorm of controversy in Latin America with his recent comment that if he is elected next year he would consider sending American troops into Mexico to fight drug cartels

While virtually all headlines from the United Nations General Assembly in New York focused on the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, there is another conflict that is going almost unnoticed despite the fact that it is causing many more deaths: the drug-related wars in Mexico, Central America, and northern South America

Every year, 500,000 Central Americans pass through Mexico on an invariably dangerous journey to the United States in search of better opportunities, but it is unknown how many reach their intended destination. Migrants are regularly treated as second-class citizens during their journey and many fall victim to the violence of criminal gangs

When the recent Summit of the Americas in Colombia decided to commission a study on whether to decriminalize drugs, many thought that would be the end of it, and the whole thing would be quickly forgotten. Well, maybe not

For the first time since the United States launched its 'war on drugs' four decades ago, there are signs that the forces supporting legalization or de-criminalization of illegal drugs are gaining momentum across the hemisphere

Latin America should take a close look at the latest U.S. technological innovation figures: They show that, despite signs of progress in several countries, the gap between Asian and Latin American countries keeps widening

Central America is experiencing increasing levels of crime and the prospect of heightened competition from Mexican drug cartels in its territory. The institutional weakness and security vulnerabilities of Guatemala and other Central American states mean that combating these trends will require significant help, most likely from the United States

With a little under a year remaining until the next U.S. presidential election, a coherent and sustainable area policy toward Latin America remains absent from the campaign literature and both parties' electoral strategies

While Mexico's bloody war against the drug cartels is making headlines worldwide, there is a little-known fact that is sounding alarm bells among U.S. and Latin American officials: Central America's drug-related violence is far worse than Mexico's

A group of 46 high-profile Mexican politicians and academics from across the ideological spectrum shook this country recently with a daring proposal to end Mexico's political gridlock: forcing whomever is elected president in 2012 to form a coalition government

In GOP primary politics, the U.S.- Mexico border fence is an immigration litmus test, but an apparently unhelpful one. Nevertheless, some 2012 candidates continue to find political capital in touting the fence

A fence along the U.S. border with Mexico illustrates a lack of understanding of the logistics and costs, the historical motivations driving U.S. immigration, and ignores a profound systemic change that must be achieved in order to address illegal immigration problems in a sustainable and cost efficient manner

For more than fifteen years, Mexico's lawmakers -- absurdly -- seemed to prefer to abolish the desire to eat rather than comply with international agreements on human rights signed by Mexico regarding the recognition of the right to food

The preparations for the Pan American Games included more than just addressing infrastructure concerns. Due to the crime environment in Mexico, security is also a very real concern for the athletes, sponsors and spectators who will visit Guadalajara during the games

Pablo Barrera drilled two crucial goals as Mexico captured their second straight CONCACAF Gold Cup title with a come-from-behind 4-2 win over team USA at the jam-packed Rose Bowl. Michael Bradley and Landon Donovan scored for the United States

The country that received the most attention during President Barack Obama's visit to Latin America -- other than Libya -- was Brazil, but the place where he will probably have the biggest, and most needed, impact will be Central America

Over the last four years, Mexicans have learnt that waging a war against organised crime not only takes a toll on human life at home, but also impacts on the complex and sometimes ambivalent relationship with their northern neighbour.

Almost two decades after the 1994 free-trade agreement among the United States, Mexico and Canada, the idea of North American integration is losing steam. China has overtaken Mexico as the second-largest U.S. trading partner, and trade between the three North American countries is diminishing as a percentage of their total trade

In the last two decades, Mexican drug cartels have acquired unprecedented power to corrupt and intimidate. Three factors account for their rise: preexisting corruption, the inability of weak law enforcement institutions to counter them, and the demand for illegal drugs in the United States.

One of the most frequent arguments of supporters of Arizona's anti-immigration law is that it doesn't do anything different than what Mexico does with undocumented Central American migrants, or what most Latin American countries do with their own illegal immigrants. It's a powerful argument, and partially true.

Not so fast, Mr. President. I'm not saying I support the Arizona immigration legislation, but I have two points to make about President Obama's claim that federal legislation is needed and that Arizona's bill is misguided

The news that Brazil and Mexico have come out of the recession and are poised for solid growth in 2010 should be celebrated, and both countries' leaders should be given credit for their sound economic management. But in the global economic context, the two Latin American giants' recovery will be modest.

A new congressional report sure to stir up the heated immigration debate finds that about 1 in 4 foreigners in America are here illegally and that 62 percent of them come from Mexico through America's most porous border

Details of the confirmed firefight remain unclear, but from all indications, a large movement of Zeta forces into a Gulf stronghold did occur, and it suggests a heightened operational tempo in the war between these two cartels. In the coming months, this increasing violence is likely to continue in Gulf-held Reynosa and Zeta-held Monterrey as well as Matamoros

To understand what the arrest of El Chango -- the leader of one of the factions of the La Familia Michoacana cartel -- means, we have to really go back and look at the flow, or really the context, of what has been happening with the Mexican cartels over the last year

In any democratic election, opposition parties always criticize the policies of the incumbent. This tactic is especially true when the country is involved in a long and costly war. This strategy is what we are seeing now in Mexico with the opposition parties criticizing the way the Calderon administration has prosecuted its war against the Mexican drug cartels

A scary new reality arrived with the long Christmas season in Mexico. This year, the Mexican government put out stark warnings to such merry travelers. Travel in convoys, in daylight and if possible, contact federal authorities for a military escort through the portions of Mexico where the drug cartel violence has been particularly gruesome

When the presidents of Brazil, Mexico and Argentina attended the G-20 meeting of the world's biggest economies in South Korea, they should have taken some time off from the conference to take a look at the host country. They could have learned why South Korea has done so much better than their own nations

If Californians legalize marijuana on Nov. 2, maybe Mexico will end its horrific drug war. The 'war on drugs,' like the war on terror, is a simplistic and brutally stupid solution imposed on a complex, multifaceted human problem, born out of the notion that you can take evil out of context and eradicate it with the firepower of righteousness

Mexico's drug cartels have become well-equipped armies thanks to a flood of semi-automatic U.S. weapons, which have been easier to get since the U.S. government allowed a 10-year ban on sales of assault weapons to expire. Does Mexico have a point in blaming Washington for part of its bloodshed? Or is it conveniently passing on the blame to the United States for its own drug violence?

The street blockades that almost paralyzed Mexico City and Buenos Aires in recent days, interrupting traffic and keeping millions of people from going to work, are becoming a major economic problem. But their invisible costs may be larger than their immediate monetary impact